No Arabic abstract
Standard inflationary models yield a characteristic signature of a primordial power spectrum with a red tensor and scalar tilt. Nevertheless, Cannone et al recently suggested that, by breaking the assumption of spatial diffeomorphism invariance in the context of the effective field theory of inflation, a blue tensor spectrum can be achieved without violating the Null Energy Condition. In this context, we explore in which cases a blue tensor tilt can be obtained along with a red tilt in the scalar spectrum. Ultimately, we analyze under which conditions this model can reproduce the specific consistency relation of String Gas Cosmology.
We investigate the cosmological perturbations in f(T) gravity. Examining the pure gravitational perturbations in the scalar sector using a diagonal vierbien, we extract the corresponding dispersion relation, which provides a constraint on the f(T) ansatzes that lead to a theory free of instabilities. Additionally, upon inclusion of the matter perturbations, we derive the fully perturbed equations of motion, and we study the growth of matter overdensities. We show that f(T) gravity with f(T) constant coincides with General Relativity, both at the background as well as at the first-order perturbation level. Applying our formalism to the power-law model we find that on large subhorizon scales (O(100 Mpc) or larger), the evolution of matter overdensity will differ from LCDM cosmology. Finally, examining the linear perturbations of the vector and tensor sectors, we find that (for the standard choice of vierbein) f(T) gravity is free of massive gravitons.
We numerically calculate the evolution of second order cosmological perturbations for an inflationary scalar field without resorting to the slow-roll approximation or assuming large scales. In contrast to previous approaches we therefore use the full non-slow-roll source term for the second order Klein-Gordon equation which is valid on all scales. The numerical results are consistent with the ones obtained previously where slow-roll is a good approximation. We investigate the effect of localised features in the scalar field potential which break slow-roll for some portion of the evolution. The numerical package solving the second order Klein-Gordon equation has been released under an open source license and is available for download.
Isocurvature perturbations naturally occur in models of inflation consisting of more than one scalar field. In this paper we calculate the spectrum of isocurvature perturbations generated at the end of inflation for three different inflationary models consisting of two canonical scalar fields. The amount of non-adiabatic pressure present at the end of inflation can have observational consequences through the generation of vorticity and subsequently the sourcing of B-mode polarisation. We compare two different definitions of isocurvature perturbations and show how these quantities evolve in different ways during inflation. Our results are calculated using the open source Pyflation numerical package which is available to download.
Calculations of the evolution of cosmological perturbations generally involve solution of a large number of coupled differential equations to describe the evolution of the multipole moments of the distribution of photon intensities and polarization. However, this Boltzmann hierarchy communicates with the rest of the system of equations for the other perturbation variables only through the photon-intensity quadrupole moment. Here I develop an alternative formulation wherein this photon-intensity quadrupole is obtained via solution of two coupled integral equations -- one for the intensity quadrupole and another for the linear-polarization quadrupole -- rather than the full Boltzmann hierarchy. This alternative method of calculation provides some physical insight and a cross-check for the traditional approach. I describe a simple and efficient iterative numerical solution that converges fairly quickly. I surmise that this may allow current state-of-the-art cosmological-perturbation codes to be accelerated.
How much does the curvature perturbation change after it leaves the horizon, and when should one evaluate the power spectrum? To answer these questions we study single field inflation models numerically, and compare the evolution of different curvature perturbations from horizon crossing to the end of inflation. In particular we calculate the number of efolds it takes for the curvature perturbation at a given wavenumber to settle down to within a given fraction of their value at the end of inflation. We find that e.g. in chaotic inflation, the amplitude of the comoving and the curvature perturbation on uniform density hypersurfaces differ by up to 180 % at horizon crossing assuming the same amplitude at the end of inflation, and that it takes approximately 3 efolds for the curvature perturbation to be within 1 % of its value at the end of inflation.